WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Mark Esper was three blocks from the FBI's Washington field office. He had planned to confer there at a security command center, but plans changed with an unexpected call to divert immediately. Go the White House. President Donald Trump wanted a briefing from him...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation's top military officer, Gen. Mark Milley, spoke privately with congressional leaders and many other lawmakers as Pentagon officials came under fire for the military's role in containing protests following the police killing of George Floyd. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D...

WASHINGTON (AP) — Scores of retired military and defense leaders are denouncing President Donald Trump and accusing him of using the U.S. Armed Forces to undermine the rights of Americans protesting police brutality and the killing of George Floyd. The condemnation Friday came in an op-ed in The...

In this Sunday, May 31, 2020 photo, Athens-Clark County police officers in riot gear and backed up by a military vehicle move in on the protesters to remove them from Broad Street in downtown Athens, Ga. The protest was organized to demonstrate the death of George Floyd, who died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25, sparking demonstrations and riots around the country. (Joshua L. Jones/Athens Banner-Herald via AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The death of George Floyd in police hands has pushed the U.S. military to search its soul and to admit that, like the rest of America, it has fallen short on racial fairness. Although the military historically has prided itself on diversity, leaders acknowledge that black troops...

A military Humvee blocks an intersection along K Street in downtown Washington as demonstrators protest the death of George Floyd, Monday, June 1, 2020, in Washington. Floyd died after being restrained by Minneapolis police officers. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The death of George Floyd in police hands has pushed the U.S. military to search its soul and to admit that, like the rest of America, it has fallen short on racial fairness. Although the military historically has prided itself on diversity, leaders acknowledge that black troops...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is not only drawing criticism from his usual political foes but also backtalk from his defense secretary, his former Pentagon chief and a growing number of Republicans. A day after Defense Secretary Mark Esper shot down Trump's idea of using active-duty...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s Pentagon chief shot down his idea of using troops to quell protests across the United States, then reversed course on pulling part of the 82nd Airborne Division off standby in an extraordinary clash between the U.S. military and its commander in chief...

FILE - In this April 1, 2020, file photo, Defense Secretary Mark Esper speaks about the coronavirus in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Mark Esper is facing the most politically charged crisis of his tenure, criticized for calling protester-filled streets a military “battle space” and accused of failing to keep the military out of politics. At the same time, 11 months into the job, Esper is...

FILE - In this Sept. 3, 2019, file photo former U.S. Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis listens to a question during his appearance at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. Mattis issued a statement Wednesday, June 3, 2020, on the recent protests around the United States. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — In an extraordinary rebuke, former defense secretary Jim Mattis on Wednesday denounced President Donald Trump's heavy-handed use of military force to quell protests near the White House and said his former boss was setting up a “false conflict" between the military and civilian...

FILE - In this April 1, 2020, file photo, Defense Secretary Mark Esper speaks about the coronavirus in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Mark Esper is facing the most politically charged crisis of his tenure, criticized for calling protester-filled streets a military “battle space” and accused of failing to keep the military out of politics. At the same time, eleven months into the job, Esper is...